Midnight Express

RORY: Hey, maybe on our big trip to Europe we could go to Prague and stay in his [Havel’s] cell.LORELAI: Absolutely. And then we can go to Turkey and stay in that place from Midnight Express.

Midnight Express is a 1978 drama film directed by Alan Parker, with screenplay by Oliver Stone, and based on the memoir of the same name by Billy Hayes. Hayes was a young American college student who was sent to prison in Istanbul for trying to smuggle hashish out of Turkey. The film’s title is prison slang for an escape attempt. Midnight Express did well at the box office and gained critical praise, receiving four Academy Awards.

The film differed from Billy Hayes’ book in several significant ways. In the film, Hayes spent several years in Sağmalcılar Prison (still in existence), although in real life he was in two other prisons as well, and escaped from a different one. As filming in the prison wasn’t an option, Midnight Express was filmed at Fort St. Elmo in Malta, which is a war museum.

This is another reminder of Rory and Lorelai’s planned trip to Europe, and that Rory seems to have Prague on the itinerary.